S-LCD, a manufacturing venture of Samsung and Sony, is planning to increase the production of large screen LCD panels by a fourth. S-LCD has a production line at a Samsung facility in South Korea that produces LCD panels for large screen TVs.

As the demand for large LCD TVs went up during this year, the two companies decided to increase production. For enlarging the capacity, Sony wants to raise 97.4 million USD. The company hopes to raise the money during the first half of 2006 and reach the new production capacity in July 2006.

Also, last month Samsung said that it will increase investment in a similar line. The company originally invested 2.3 billions USD to build its own production line.

The original investment is enough to get production started in April 2006, for a maximum capacity of 45,000 glass sheets per month. The additional funding will double the production. The actual number of LCD panels that can be produced each month varies depending on the size of the panel. The production line can manufacture sheets of 187cm by 220cm, the so-called 7th generation sheets.